Detroit Free Press Staff Writer

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Harmony Langford, 37, of Grand Blanc, and her mom, Sheila Edwards, 54, of Goodrich, showed up at an event wearing similar tops in the same pattern. / Langford family photo

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Say you have to attend an important event.

Say you spend many days -- and way too much money, not to mention all those phone calls and text photos to very patient friends -- trying to find the perfect dress, only to arrive at the important event and discover another woman wearing the same thing.

What do you do?

When that very thing happened to me recently -- at the North American International Auto Show Charity Preview -- I smiled and waved at my doppelgänger, thinking she would do the same and we'd have a good laugh and maybe even a picture together in our matching plum-colored lace sheaths with 3/4-length sleeves.

Apparently, she wasn't amused.

She didn't return my smile or wave.

She didn't make eye contact.

She walked by, head held high, as if I didn't exist.

Once we passed, her male companion took a look, whipping his head around with such force I was sure he'd spend the rest of the evening accessorizing his tuxedo with not just a crisp white shirt but with a neck brace as well.

I laughed out loud.

Ten years ago, maybe even 5, I would have been mortified -- on a low self-esteem day, I might have cried -- about encountering someone wearing my same dress.

As women, we all want to think there's something special about us, that we're one-of-a-kind -- and we are when it comes to personality or insights or abilities.

But unless we're being dressed by a high-end designer, there's not much special about us when it comes to clothing.

Most of us shop at the same places, gravitate toward the same colors -- the charity gala was a sea of dresses in black, red and a variety of metallics -- and the same conventions.

"Really, Macy's is about the only place you can go to get a decent dress," says Harmony Langford, who is 37, lives in Grand Blanc and works as chief program officer for the YWCA in Flint.

"Because I'm in fund-raising, I go to a lot of events," she says. "All of the people that kind of run in our circle know that if there's a ball or a formal event, or anything where you need a cocktail dress or something dressy you have to go down to Oakland County" where there are more stores. "Otherwise, you will show up in the same dress."

Which is kind of what happened at an awards luncheon that Langford -- who had been nominated for a community service award -- invited her mother to attend.

"The night before the event, I was at her house," Langford says. "She said, 'What are you wearing tomorrow?' I said, 'I'm wearing this dress; it's got this black-and-white-checkered pattern on it.' She said, 'Oh, OK.' That's all she said. The next day I'm at the lunch, I'm greeting people and she has on this exact same print! She said, 'You've got to be kidding me!' I said, 'What do you mean, I told you what I was going to wear!' She said, 'I thought it was small checks!' "

"You can either make a joke about it or freak out," says Langford.

She and her mother chose the former, though they purposely didn't sit next to each other at the luncheon. "I knew all eyes would be on us!" says Langford.

When Rachel Hoke, 49, of East Lansing got to her husband's work party, she realized she wasn't just wearing the same dress as another woman, she was wearing the same necklace, which her husband had talked her into buying in the first place.

"Initially, I said, 'Oh, crap, are you kidding me?' " says Hoke. "It's always a skinny little blond that's wearing the same outfit as me. I can't have someone who doesn't look nearly as good in the outfit as me wearing it?"

Feeling partly responsible, perhaps, "my husband actually suggested, and I blew him off, he was, 'If you take this necklace and kind of loop it back around your neck it won't look the same.' "

In the end, Hoke and the other woman, an acquaintance, posed for photos together.

When their husbands realized they were wearing the same light green shirt -- Kohl's! -- they got in the picture, too.

"You may as well laugh it off and have a good time," says Hoke.

"You know what though," she adds. "I do think that comes with age and maturity and security. If I was really insecure, I might have gone and changed or something."

And maybe that's the thing to remember -- it's not what we wear, it's all about our attitude and how we wear it.

Few things are as striking as a confident woman -- especially if she's surrounded by other women wearing the exact same thing.